3 of family gunned down in Thathri

1st April 1999Daily Excelsior

JAMMU: Militants gunned down three members of a family in their
house at village Kither in Thathri tehsil of Doda
district last night while security forces averted a major
tragedy when they detected and defused a powerful bomb at
Kharpura in Banihal today.

A police spokesman said a
group of militants attacked the house of Mohd Akbar,
whose son is a Special Police Officer (SPO) in Doda, last
mid-night when the family was asleep in their house.
Militants dragged out the family members and opened
indiscriminate firing on them.

All the three family
members, present in the house, were killed on the spot in
militants firing. Militants, numbering three-four,
escaped from the spot and fled towards upper reaches.

Neighbourers of the
victims gathered on the spot after militants escape
and trekked a distance of about two kms to inform at a
security picket. Security personnel rushed to the spot
and combed the area immediately.

The security jawans,
assisted by the local police, launched a search operation
in the area in the wee hours of this morning to apprehend
the militants involved in the attack. Some suspects have
been rounded up by the security forces but no formal
arrest has been made so far.

The victims have been
identified as Mohd Akbar, his wife Gulshan Begum and son
Aziz Hussain. Their bodies were buried by the local
people in the village today after post-mortem.

Police said younger son of
Mohd Akbar was engaged as SPO with the district police of
Doda. This could be one of the reason behind elimination
of the family as militants had already warned local
people not to work as SPO with police and Army.

Senior police officers
from Thathri also rushed to the spot today and were
camping there when the reports last came in. Tension had
gripped the village with local people protesting against
the barbaric killings of the innocent civilians.

Meanwhile, security forces
today managed to avert a major tragedy when they
recovered an IED planted on National Highway at the
out-skirts of Banihal town. The mine contained 3 kg of
explosive material, powerful enough to blow up a bus.

A road opening party led
by Maj R B Upadyaya while on its routine exercise of
clearance of road, detected a patch of mud on broken area
of tramatted road at about 0915 hours in the morning. On
suspecting foul play, the team put the nine detector and
sniffer dogs into action which confirmed presence of
explosive material. The area around the spot was also
laid with big stones by the militants to ensure diversion
of the traffic to go over the spot to ensure casualties.

Security forces took
prompt action in stopping the traffic north of Jawahar
Tunnel and fourth of Lachlana to ensure that there are no
road blockades and search operations are not hampered.
Later, the forces cordoned off the area and searched it
extensively for presence of additional IED and militants
wanting to take advantage of the situation.

The explosive handling
squad was pressed into action which finally destroyed the
IED by blowing it up. The impact of this explosive was so
severe that it created a big crater inside the ground.

It may be recalled that
this is second instance in last one year where militants
have tried to sensationalise militancy in Doda by using
highway to target security forces and create fear in
hearts and mind of people but have failed in both the
attempts.